Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Apps4NSW Mashup Competition Entries

The All Things Spatial blog has been keeping a close eye on Australian mashup competitions. Last year All Things Spatial allowed me to repost their comprehensive round-up of entries to the MashupAustralia competition.

They have now given me permission to repost their round-up of the Apps4NSW mashup competition run by the New South Wales government.

StatMapStatMap allows users to display interactively, as choropleth maps, a range of NSW statistics, including population data, crime and transport related information.

The map has simple drop-down selection options for data themes, geography (choice of Local Government Areas and Electorates) and time frame (by relevant year). If you mouse-over specific regions you can view region and summary information; clicking loads an additional window with a graph and table options showing additional details about the area. This application is built with the Google Maps for Flash API.

An interactive legend also allows users to choose a preferred colour scheme for the choropleth map.

WebMapThis Google Maps mashup is an example of a simple campus directory. It allows users to search for specific buildings or places of interest using text search or by picking from a list of categorised objects (eg. car parks, buildings, sport grounds, childcare).

Selected objects are then highlighted on the map and additional details are shown in a pop-up information balloon.

The Apps4NSW competition has also seen a number of iPhone applications submitted. All the iPhone applications are available for free from the iTunes store.

FiresNSW allows users to locate incidents reported by NSW Rural Fire Service. All incidents are colour-coded according to alert level (Advice, Watch and Act, or Emergency Warning) and are listed in order of distance from current user location. Incident locations are marked on a map with coloured pins and, where available, extents of fire damage are shown on the map as coloured polygons.

That's Camping! is an application that allows users to locate the nearest campsite based on current location. There are 250 camping grounds listed (NSW only) with basic description of available facilities, access restrictions as well as key attractions in the vicinity.

Gluten Free NSW is an application which lists gluten-free friendly restaurants and cafes within New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory. The application allows the user to easily find restaurants closest to the user's current location or in a particular suburb. There are over 650 restaurant listed and results can be viewed on a map.

NSW Crime this application gives the user the ability to research crime data in NSW.

Find Medicare offices near you pinpoints on a Google Map the user's current location and presents nearest offices. Integration with Google Maps allows the user to access many useful features such as directions, Street View, bookmark and share, and real-time traffic information.